[00:03.150 --> 00:07.010]  We are safer because we are on the offense against our enemies overseas.
[00:07.410 --> 00:12.850]  It's already four years since the war in Iraq began, and today there's no apparent end in sight.
[00:12.970 --> 00:17.250]  We're safer because of the skill and sacrifice of the brave Americans who defend our people.
[00:17.430 --> 00:27.190]  Hi, I'm Mario Murillo, host of the Friday edition of Wake Up Call, inviting Long Island listeners to a special community forum and debate on Wednesday, March 21st at 6.30 p.m.
[00:27.290 --> 00:30.730]  at the Monroe Lecture Hall of Hofstra University in Hempstead, Long Island.
[00:30.730 --> 00:36.630]  We'll bring together voices from various sectors to examine the state of the war and the options for an end to the conflict.
[00:36.990 --> 00:45.310]  Peace activists, policy analysts, academics, students, and a number of Iraq war veterans will debate the president's escalation and the justification for the war.
[00:45.730 --> 00:54.710]  Speakers include historian Carolyn Eisenberg, Leslie Kagan of United for Peace and Justice, and Rob Timmons of Iraq-Afghanistan Veterans of America, among many others.
[00:54.710 --> 00:58.070]  That's Wednesday, March 21st at 6.30 p.m.
[00:58.330 --> 01:01.610]  at the Monroe Lecture Hall in the South Campus of Hofstra University.
[01:01.850 --> 01:06.670]  For more information, call 516-463-5667.
[01:06.810 --> 01:07.990]  I hope to see you there.
[01:09.710 --> 01:12.030]  And don't disappoint, Tim, because it's already started.
[01:12.130 --> 01:20.310]  It's a half hour ago, so head on over to Long Island and see that event while you're listening to us as you're driving like a maniac to get there.
[01:20.310 --> 01:24.950]  It's 7 o'clock here on WBAI in New York on a Wednesday night.
[01:24.950 --> 01:27.450]  That means it's time once again for Off the Hook.
[02:24.450 --> 02:25.610]  And a very good evening to everybody.
[02:25.750 --> 02:27.090]  The program is Off the Hook.
[02:27.210 --> 02:29.650]  Emmanuel Goldstein here with you on this Wednesday evening.
[02:30.770 --> 02:34.410]  And tonight, I'm joined in the studio, as usual, by Mike.
[02:34.730 --> 02:34.950]  Hi.
[02:36.010 --> 02:39.550]  And, well, I'm glad to see the three of you are back and looking so well.
[02:39.830 --> 02:42.590]  Jim, Arseny, and Redbird, you're all back in the studio.
[02:42.790 --> 02:43.030]  Welcome.
[02:43.310 --> 02:43.470]  Hi.
[02:43.870 --> 02:44.090]  Hello.
[02:44.630 --> 02:48.430]  And, well, just a solidarity, all that kind of thing.
[02:48.530 --> 02:49.530]  It's good to see you back.
[02:49.530 --> 02:50.350]  It's great to be back.
[02:50.550 --> 02:51.170]  Yeah, yeah.
[02:51.170 --> 02:52.270]  It's great to be alive.
[02:52.550 --> 02:53.570]  Hopefully that won't happen again.
[02:54.310 --> 02:55.830]  And over on the other side of the room, not Kevin.
[02:56.170 --> 02:56.570]  Hello.
[02:57.970 --> 03:00.610]  We've been trying to reach Bernie S.
[03:01.370 --> 03:02.970]  in Poland, I believe.
[03:03.130 --> 03:08.130]  But, well, I think you guys will all back me up when you say that it hasn't worked, right?
[03:08.270 --> 03:09.910]  We've been trying and trying and trying.
[03:10.050 --> 03:13.110]  Yeah, and just everything we tried just doesn't seem to work out.
[03:13.310 --> 03:15.210]  So, I don't know.
[03:15.270 --> 03:16.710]  We just can't seem to make that connection.
[03:16.890 --> 03:17.970]  Maybe we'll hear from him.
[03:18.050 --> 03:19.510]  Maybe he'll reach us.
[03:19.570 --> 03:20.050]  That would be nice.
[03:20.730 --> 03:29.610]  But on the phone, joining us from Washington State is a 2,600 columnist and phone freak extraordinaire, the prophet.
[03:30.870 --> 03:32.650]  A phone freak extraordinaire.
[03:32.870 --> 03:35.510]  Wow, that's a tough introduction to follow.
[03:35.690 --> 03:38.070]  Well, yeah, you don't really have to follow it, but just acknowledge it.
[03:38.290 --> 03:42.590]  In fact, you know more about phones, I think, than most people ever to have walked the earth.
[03:42.870 --> 03:46.430]  So, and I don't mean to, you know, say that as too much of a compliment.
[03:46.430 --> 03:49.410]  That's just, that's your lot in life, I suppose.
[03:50.630 --> 03:51.230]  Yeah, yeah.
[03:51.370 --> 03:55.870]  Well, you know, it's important to have phones, I think.
[03:56.070 --> 03:57.770]  Yeah, phones are important.
[03:57.870 --> 03:59.110]  They have been important over the years.
[03:59.110 --> 04:01.350]  And they've certainly changed over the years.
[04:01.730 --> 04:05.730]  And phones today are nothing like they were even 10 years ago, let alone 20 years ago.
[04:06.550 --> 04:08.850]  Yeah, I keep hearing telephonies dying.
[04:09.070 --> 04:11.830]  And, you know, we still keep making phone calls.
[04:11.830 --> 04:13.890]  I'm not sure quite how that works.
[04:14.090 --> 04:21.550]  But, you know, I've been hearing for probably as long as I've been alive that it's just all going to be email and instant messaging.
[04:21.550 --> 04:24.230]  And we're going to have voice data and video convergence.
[04:24.690 --> 04:27.550]  And, well, you know, it hasn't happened and we're still making phone calls.
[04:28.170 --> 04:31.370]  Yeah, and, you know, people say that music is dying every other day.
[04:31.810 --> 04:33.670]  And there's always something new that comes along.
[04:33.830 --> 04:34.570]  Same thing with phones.
[04:34.710 --> 04:36.050]  Same thing with hacking.
[04:36.330 --> 04:38.450]  Same thing with technology in general.
[04:38.450 --> 04:40.430]  It's always going to be something different, something new.
[04:40.990 --> 04:42.430]  And something unanticipated.
[04:42.550 --> 04:43.630]  And that's what we're here to talk about.
[04:44.530 --> 04:48.630]  Okay, we've got a bunch of stories we want to cover in the brief time we have.
[04:48.670 --> 04:52.210]  And, of course, we'll be taking phone calls, as we usually do.
[04:53.150 --> 04:55.030]  This is interesting because it's local.
[04:55.130 --> 05:01.090]  The FBI's expanded use of national security letters originated in New York City after the September 11th attacks.
[05:01.090 --> 05:09.310]  And it's being challenged by a small internet service provider in New York who was under a gag order, barring him from talking about the case.
[05:09.330 --> 05:12.390]  It's funny how it's a first-person type of internet service provider.
[05:12.390 --> 05:15.690]  This is a guy who's an internet service provider, apparently.
[05:15.890 --> 05:18.370]  Or it's just, I guess, the president of the company or something.
[05:18.950 --> 05:31.810]  The lawsuit is believed to be one of only two constitutional challenges to the Patriot Act provisions that have dramatically broadened the FBI's authority to gather confidential information about thousands of Americans in the supposed effort to hunt terrorists.
[05:32.230 --> 05:35.730]  The identity of the small businessman is under government seal.
[05:35.970 --> 05:42.290]  However, if you're one of our listeners, please call us and disguise your voice or something and tell us firsthand.
[05:44.150 --> 05:50.070]  Tens of thousands of individuals have been served with requests for information that the FBI calls national security letters.
[05:50.430 --> 05:52.970]  I imagine one of our listeners must have gotten one of these somewhere.
[05:53.110 --> 05:55.310]  You can maybe send us a copy, block out your name.
[05:55.410 --> 05:55.910]  It'd be kind of cool.
[05:56.770 --> 06:02.970]  These are de facto administrative subpoenas for phone, bank, credit card, and internet records that can be used in anti-terror probes.
[06:03.110 --> 06:06.970]  Now, this lawsuit is expected to be heard next month in federal district court here in Manhattan.
[06:06.970 --> 06:24.450]  It's getting renewed attention against the backdrop of last week's report by the Justice Department's Inspector General that the FBI engaged in widespread misuse of its authority in issuing more than 143,000 requests for information on thousands of Americans and foreigners between 2003 and 2005.
[06:24.450 --> 06:26.130]  Now, that's the Justice Department saying that.
[06:26.190 --> 06:29.510]  You can imagine what ordinary citizens will say.
[06:29.630 --> 06:31.370]  So this is going to be heard in court.
[06:31.530 --> 06:33.930]  What if I go to the court and look to see who's there?
[06:33.930 --> 06:37.290]  I think they digitize out the guy in court somehow.
[06:37.670 --> 06:38.790]  I don't know how that's going to work.
[06:38.870 --> 06:39.270]  I really don't.
[06:39.370 --> 06:40.390]  Maybe he just won't say anything.
[06:40.550 --> 06:45.670]  Maybe he's just filing the suit and he's just going to sit in the sidelines with the rest of us.
[06:45.730 --> 06:51.490]  But still, there's probably only, at most, a few heads of internet service providers in the room at any one moment.
[06:51.510 --> 06:52.290]  Maybe it's one of us.
[06:52.490 --> 06:56.050]  How can you tell the head of an internet service company by looking at them?
[06:56.410 --> 06:57.730]  Do they have a halo or something?
[06:57.730 --> 06:59.450]  They have a special hat that they all have to wear.
[06:59.710 --> 07:02.590]  Well, here's something that this anonymous person said in court papers.
[07:02.590 --> 07:12.530]  I find it ironic that before I received the NSL, National Security Letters, I think we should become familiar with that phrase, I freely engaged in political debate on the government's use of the Patriot Act.
[07:12.610 --> 07:19.130]  But now that I've received one of these letters and I know much more about the way the Patriot Act works, I am prevented from talking.
[07:19.430 --> 07:26.110]  My experience has made me feel even more strongly that the public should be able to monitor how the government is using these new powers.
[07:26.770 --> 07:28.170]  So look what you did, government.
[07:28.170 --> 07:36.470]  You really, you got this guy angry and now, now somebody more well-informed is speaking out against the Patriot Act and all the abuses therein.
[07:38.170 --> 07:38.650]  Okay.
[07:38.810 --> 07:44.390]  Now this is an interesting story that we got out of England, of course, with the spy capital of the world.
[07:44.850 --> 07:51.830]  Hidden spy cameras will be used to catch residents who leave their rubbish out on the wrong day.
[07:52.350 --> 07:52.530]  Yeah.
[07:53.050 --> 07:56.690]  The fight against terror goes to all sorts of extremes.
[07:57.530 --> 08:06.850]  Now these cameras will be hidden in objects such as baked bean cans, probably the Heinz baked bean, you know, the blue one, not the green one, because they have the blue one over there in England.
[08:07.590 --> 08:10.190]  And they really take it seriously, so don't mess with them.
[08:11.050 --> 08:11.810]  They're going to hide...
[08:11.810 --> 08:17.490]  It seems to me, though, that if there's a Heinz baked bean can out in the street, wouldn't someone want to throw it out, especially if rubbish is involved?
[08:17.590 --> 08:18.270]  Exactly what I was thinking.
[08:18.270 --> 08:18.470]  Yeah.
[08:18.850 --> 08:22.290]  And also they're going to hide them in house bricks to catch the offenders.
[08:22.470 --> 08:24.670]  Now I guess people won't be trying to throw house bricks out.
[08:24.910 --> 08:33.930]  So they're going to come over to my house, perhaps, and slam out a brick and put their own brick in there and possibly affect the structural integrity of my house?
[08:34.070 --> 08:35.270]  Unless they've already done it.
[08:35.370 --> 08:36.730]  Unless it's been there for decades.
[08:37.210 --> 08:40.210]  Does it say whether the cameras are going to be wireless or what?
[08:41.350 --> 08:42.030]  Let's see.
[08:42.030 --> 08:48.990]  I didn't see anything indicating that, but I would imagine they're probably capable of doing something like that.
[08:49.130 --> 08:52.290]  Wouldn't people be able to watch the footage?
[08:52.290 --> 08:53.030]  What are you going to see?
[08:53.130 --> 08:54.250]  Somebody throwing out the trash?
[08:54.810 --> 08:59.150]  You'll be able to figure out where the camera is and maybe kick some dirt over it?
[08:59.370 --> 08:59.870]  Steal it?
[09:00.090 --> 09:07.750]  Well, I think you could probably figure out where the camera is through other means by looking for certain holes or things like that.
[09:07.750 --> 09:13.630]  Anyway, London's Evening Standard says the CCTV devices are being used to snare fly tippers.
[09:14.170 --> 09:15.070]  What's a fly tipper?
[09:15.250 --> 09:19.370]  It's another one of these English words that makes absolutely no sense to us.
[09:19.490 --> 09:21.150]  Is it like a cow tipper, but for flies?
[09:21.350 --> 09:22.550]  It doesn't seem that interesting.
[09:22.550 --> 09:22.970]  I don't know.
[09:22.970 --> 09:25.670]  Or it's somebody who knocks flies over while they're sleeping.
[09:26.890 --> 09:29.710]  Yeah, or hands flies...
[09:29.710 --> 09:32.530]  Stop now before it gets too erotic.
[09:32.990 --> 09:34.770]  Hands flies money, maybe?
[09:35.290 --> 09:35.770]  I don't know.
[09:36.270 --> 09:37.610]  And also graffiti vandals.
[09:38.350 --> 09:42.530]  They'll also be used to punish those who take their rubbish bags out for collection on the wrong day.
[09:42.670 --> 09:47.490]  Offenders face on-the-spot fines of up to 1,000 pounds, as well as attracting vermin.
[09:47.690 --> 09:53.610]  Bags left out for long periods are prone to spitting... splitting, rather, and spewing rubbish on the streets.
[09:54.190 --> 10:01.290]  The cameras will be installed by Ealing counselors around the West London borough before rubbish collections become fortnightly instead of weekly.
[10:03.430 --> 10:07.210]  Yeah, so apparently they're racing against time to meet that deadline.
[10:07.750 --> 10:14.370]  Now, Mike, you had an interesting story here about Kenya being a country that's doing something crazy with mobile phones.
[10:14.410 --> 10:17.910]  And maybe Profit can also help us with this, if he's ever heard of something like this.
[10:18.010 --> 10:19.490]  Sure, this story comes from The Guardian.
[10:19.490 --> 10:28.310]  And they're reporting that in Kenya, they've got this new system called M-Pesa, which allows people to send money by SMS.
[10:29.530 --> 10:31.110]  Send money by SMS?
[10:31.590 --> 10:31.730]  Yeah.
[10:31.730 --> 10:39.930]  Apparently, you go to the store and you buy a code, and you can SMS the code, and your recipient can then trade that code in for money.
[10:40.970 --> 10:49.910]  In just a couple weeks, 10,000 people have used it and transferred 8 million shillings, however much that is.
[10:51.610 --> 10:58.050]  And what's interesting about it is that the fees are a lot lower than banks charged to transfer money from place to place.
[10:58.050 --> 11:06.770]  And a lot of people in Kenya, of course, don't have bank accounts and checkbooks and all this stuff that people over here are used to send money for free.
[11:06.930 --> 11:08.830]  So it's really interesting.
[11:09.050 --> 11:09.230]  No, I understand.
[11:09.290 --> 11:11.250]  You don't need a new handset or a SIM card.
[11:11.390 --> 11:22.170]  If you want to send money, you just hand over the cash to a registered agent, like a grocery store clerk or a news agent or something, who credits your virtual account.
[11:22.170 --> 11:27.730]  And then you send the money, and it shows up in the recipient's account.
[11:27.730 --> 11:31.850]  They then cash it in at an agent by entering a secret code and showing ID.
[11:32.530 --> 11:37.790]  Now, what I find fascinating about this is the growth of mobile phones in Kenya, as in most of Africa.
[11:38.290 --> 11:41.950]  In June 1999, they had 15,000 mobile subscribers.
[11:42.130 --> 11:46.510]  Today, they have nearly 8 million, and their population is 35 million.
[11:47.250 --> 11:54.370]  They have two operators, and their network is as extensive, according to this story, it's as extensive as the access to banks is limited.
[11:54.370 --> 12:05.510]  What is interesting here is actually that the system works across mobile networks, which is something that, if they tried this in the United States, you can be sure they would take a long time to get right.
[12:05.670 --> 12:06.710]  Because of all the different networks.
[12:06.950 --> 12:17.570]  Yeah, well, what they do is they would, you know, each network would probably want to wall it off, try the new service from T-Mobile or whoever, and, you know, not let you send money to your friends with Singular.
[12:18.210 --> 12:20.550]  Well, you said it was just a code that they SMS, right?
[12:21.410 --> 12:23.790]  So, it doesn't even sound like it's SMS-specific.
[12:24.030 --> 12:25.990]  It could be, you can send it anyway, yeah.
[12:26.490 --> 12:30.390]  But, wait, but isn't there some kind of secret password?
[12:31.150 --> 12:37.870]  Does the person you send it to, you have to tell them, this is your password, I'm going to send you money, and then they get the secret other code?
[12:37.890 --> 12:40.870]  Well, the remote person enters a secret code, and they show ID.
[12:40.970 --> 12:46.690]  I don't know if they define the secret code themselves in advance, or if, well, here's security concern.
[12:47.410 --> 12:54.790]  Safaricom, which is one of the providers over there, says that even if someone's phone is stolen, the PIN system prevents unauthorized withdrawals.
[12:54.990 --> 13:00.570]  The only danger is sending cash to the wrong mobile number and the recipient redeeming it right away.
[13:00.750 --> 13:02.890]  So, that's definitely a concern.
[13:03.010 --> 13:05.270]  It's sort of like a bank transfer where you transfer it to the wrong bank.
[13:06.110 --> 13:07.550]  Profit, have you ever heard of anything like this?
[13:08.170 --> 13:13.410]  Yeah, there's a system called OboPay in the U.S., O-B-O-P-A-Y.com.
[13:13.610 --> 13:25.350]  And that works as well in a similar way to what you're describing, except that you need a bank account or a credit card to link it to, which, you know, obviously is not available in Kenya.
[13:25.870 --> 13:35.470]  One other thing that I've seen is some Indian mobile operators are beginning to use their minutes as a currency, and you can actually transfer prepaid minutes from one account to another.
[13:35.610 --> 13:44.990]  And so, some merchants have taken to accepting mobile phone minutes as a form of payment since many people in India don't have landlines.
[13:45.130 --> 13:48.470]  They only have mobile phones, just as the case in Kenya is.
[13:48.630 --> 13:51.370]  And that actually is a really good point worth bringing up.
[13:51.570 --> 13:58.390]  The growth worldwide in telephony is overwhelmingly in the mobile phone space.
[13:58.590 --> 14:05.590]  We're seeing, you know, much, much, much more rapid increases and actually decline in landlines on a worldwide basis.
[14:05.830 --> 14:09.450]  So, I think that that's a kind of new and interesting development.
[14:09.730 --> 14:13.430]  In a lot of these countries, it takes two or three years to get a landline.
[14:13.630 --> 14:16.730]  And you can go down to a mobile phone shop and have a phone the same day.
[14:17.450 --> 14:19.730]  Aren't these systems prone to being intercepted?
[14:19.890 --> 14:25.010]  I mean, if you intercept an SMS and you decrypt it, you have, you know, almost unlimited funds.
[14:25.370 --> 14:26.070]  That's a good point.
[14:26.270 --> 14:37.350]  Well, SMSs are sent across... they're sent across mobile networks that are encrypted in, you know, pretty poor and slipshod fashion, particularly GSM, but...
[14:37.350 --> 14:38.610]  Are they encrypted?
[14:38.730 --> 14:39.390]  Are they encrypted?
[14:39.510 --> 14:43.990]  Or are they, in fact, a phone employee might be able to read all the SMSs that were sent back and forth?
[14:44.030 --> 14:49.350]  I think I read somewhere where police were able to obtain somebody's SMS messages back and forth.
[14:49.410 --> 14:49.950]  Is that not true?
[14:50.470 --> 14:52.150]  Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, of course.
[14:52.330 --> 14:54.930]  I mean, the police can intercept any SMS.
[14:55.010 --> 15:00.370]  In fact, SMSs are archived for seven years with many phone carriers in the US.
[15:00.550 --> 15:01.810]  So, that tells me there's no encryption.
[15:02.130 --> 15:04.230]  There's no encryption going on, then, with SMS.
[15:04.290 --> 15:06.110]  Well, it's encrypted across the air.
[15:06.250 --> 15:09.110]  So, from your handset to the tower, it's encrypted.
[15:09.310 --> 15:12.010]  And then from there, you know, across the mobile network, it's not.
[15:12.190 --> 15:17.070]  And then on the other end, it's, you know, from the tower to your handset, it's, again, encrypted.
[15:17.370 --> 15:21.570]  So, picking it up with a scanner over the air, it's possible to do.
[15:21.690 --> 15:24.630]  And it took the French something like six hours to break GSM.
[15:24.630 --> 15:27.370]  So, it's not all that hard in the case of GSM to break.
[15:28.750 --> 15:36.030]  But it's more trouble than it's worth in a lot of cases, especially when you're talking about really small amounts of money or not very interesting messages.
[15:36.310 --> 15:42.370]  But, you know, there's back doors built in at the MTSO level, which is the mobile telephone switching office.
[15:42.650 --> 15:48.390]  And, you know, if you're a telephone company employee or law enforcement, you can intercept any SMS message or any phone call.
[15:49.350 --> 15:51.350]  Let me quickly predict the future.
[15:51.390 --> 15:52.650]  And first, a little background.
[15:52.930 --> 15:57.930]  The US Embassy in Kenya was bombed in the late 1990s by an Al-Qaeda cell.
[15:58.110 --> 16:02.530]  And Kenya has a small, but substantial Muslim population.
[16:03.030 --> 16:17.210]  Two to one, the FBI is going to look at this as an untraceable source of cash and is going to go over there and try to get records of this and for whatever purposes that they want.
[16:18.170 --> 16:19.570]  This is not good.
[16:19.970 --> 16:22.630]  Well, I imagine they would do that no matter what country was involved.
[16:23.730 --> 16:24.770]  Quite probably.
[16:24.950 --> 16:27.230]  It's part of the whole looking into the banking transactions.
[16:27.230 --> 16:27.810]  Right.
[16:27.930 --> 16:33.230]  But this is this is a bigger target than, say, Switzerland would be if Switzerland had a program like this.
[16:33.970 --> 16:36.230]  Well, it'd be interesting to see if this spreads to other countries.
[16:36.530 --> 16:39.570]  Do you think the day will ever come where we have such a system here?
[16:40.130 --> 16:40.690]  Could be.
[16:41.330 --> 16:48.050]  There's already monitoring of international banking transactions that's done by the Office of Foreign Assets Control and the US Customs Service.
[16:48.330 --> 16:50.310]  A lot of countries are involved in doing this.
[16:50.530 --> 16:53.270]  They're interested any time that you transfer money out of the countries.
[16:53.270 --> 16:53.890]  Right.
[16:53.890 --> 16:57.350]  But this means a lot more people can can be transferring money.
[16:57.470 --> 17:02.390]  People who don't have access to banks are able to transfer money now and hence be watched by the authorities.
[17:02.630 --> 17:09.470]  Also, you could throw in a lot of intermediates on the Kenyanist side, including possibly some with no names connected to the phone.
[17:10.410 --> 17:10.850]  Yeah.
[17:11.390 --> 17:13.170]  Does this work on a prepaid account, I wonder?
[17:13.550 --> 17:13.790]  Yeah.
[17:13.950 --> 17:14.610]  That's what I'm thinking.
[17:14.790 --> 17:15.310]  Why shouldn't it?
[17:15.990 --> 17:21.830]  It's a very fair statement that any time that there's data out there about what you're doing, the police will be interested in looking at it.
[17:22.350 --> 17:22.830]  Absolutely.
[17:23.950 --> 17:24.530]  All right.
[17:24.690 --> 17:28.410]  Here's some other phone services that are being launched.
[17:28.970 --> 17:33.910]  This comes from Max in Swarthmore, who notified us about this.
[17:33.970 --> 17:39.710]  This is a GPS locator service for cell phones, which lets any user track the location of their quote unquote friends.
[17:40.390 --> 17:47.610]  We've had GPS and phones for years for 911 service, and now it's being opened up to actually allow the phone users to do tracking, but also to be tracked.
[17:48.030 --> 17:52.050]  Of course, if people who want to be tracked can be, they can just as well track those who don't want to be.
[17:52.550 --> 18:00.150]  Like Facebook or MySpace, people are putting an enormous amount of personal information out there with the idea that it's just going to their friends.
[18:00.150 --> 18:12.030]  Now, he sent us a link to a site called BoostMobile.com, and they run this service called Boost... I don't know how to pronounce this.
[18:12.030 --> 18:13.070]  It's Loopt.
[18:13.190 --> 18:14.890]  It's L-O-O-P-T.
[18:15.510 --> 18:25.550]  And just to read a very brief part from their webpage, Boost Loopt, which is a silly name, is a mobile service that connects you to the people, places, and events around you.
[18:25.670 --> 18:30.530]  It's a closed network meant to be used with friends you see and speak to on a regular basis.
[18:30.790 --> 18:35.730]  Many times a day, your friends are nearby and free to hang out without you knowing it.
[18:37.050 --> 18:37.590]  Wait a minute.
[18:37.990 --> 18:39.390]  Let's just... a reality check here.
[18:39.550 --> 18:43.470]  No, they're nearby, and they don't want you to know they're nearby because they don't want to hang out with you.
[18:43.490 --> 18:44.050]  How about that?
[18:44.430 --> 18:49.670]  But no, this is the best of all worlds where they... yeah, they want to hang out with you at all times, and you need to know when they're nearby.
[18:50.470 --> 18:51.990]  Boost Loopt... Looped.
[18:52.450 --> 18:53.230]  Boost Looped.
[18:53.670 --> 18:54.590]  You don't know slang, do you?
[18:54.710 --> 18:56.430]  Gotta change... what's the slang?
[18:56.470 --> 18:56.870]  Is there slang?
[18:57.070 --> 18:58.750]  I think that's what they're trying to do.
[18:58.830 --> 19:00.010]  That's the market they're targeting, right?
[19:00.090 --> 19:00.870]  The slang speaking.
[19:01.050 --> 19:02.070]  Otherwise, it wouldn't be called Boost.
[19:02.330 --> 19:11.450]  Do you remember when Omnipoint used to refer to re-ups as a way to refill your phones, you know, for pre-paid... yeah, it's incredible.
[19:11.810 --> 19:17.170]  Anyway, Boost Looped makes sure you never miss that opportunity for a spontaneous meetup.
[19:18.730 --> 19:19.510]  I don't know.
[19:19.710 --> 19:20.930]  Should we be worried about this?
[19:21.250 --> 19:23.010]  We actually covered this a while ago.
[19:23.090 --> 19:31.630]  This service has been around for a few months, and I think the biggest security concern here is that, say, I'm a child molester, and I want to stalk someone.
[19:32.330 --> 19:33.850]  I will always know where they are.
[19:33.850 --> 19:33.850]  Yeah.
[19:33.990 --> 19:46.450]  Well, don't they have to agree to be monitored or to be on... because all the things on this webpage here say that if you don't want to be part of this service, you just send a certain message, say, drop me.
[19:46.510 --> 19:49.670]  But I guess my suspicion in that is, how do you know that worked?
[19:49.750 --> 19:51.310]  How do you know that they're not actually watching you?
[19:51.470 --> 19:56.170]  Even assuming it works, there's a percentage of the population is not going to figure it out.
[19:57.150 --> 20:02.170]  And they're just going to say, hey, can I borrow your phone and authorize it or what have you?
[20:02.330 --> 20:06.390]  I'm worried that there will be an opt-out type of a system, where it'll be the default.
[20:06.530 --> 20:12.810]  You have this as part of your phone, and if you want to turn it off, and then there will be the people that are suspicious.
[20:13.450 --> 20:17.270]  Maybe, you know, you're child molesters, or maybe criminals of other sorts.
[20:17.770 --> 20:19.510]  And we need to know where they are at all times.
[20:19.810 --> 20:31.930]  So not only, not only will they be known to whatever friends they have, but you can hop onto the internet and see where they are and just monitor their movements at all times, or at least the movements of their phones, which is sort of a different thing.
[20:31.930 --> 20:33.410]  I think a lot of people kind of forget about that.
[20:33.510 --> 20:38.230]  I mean, there's certainly requirements for certain classes of criminals to have monitoring.
[20:38.570 --> 20:41.290]  A lot of sex offenders have to have it for a long, long time.
[20:41.590 --> 20:43.070]  So... Profit, what do you think about this?
[20:43.130 --> 20:43.650]  Should we be worried?
[20:44.910 --> 20:48.450]  Uh, you know, anytime you have the technology there, there's scope creep.
[20:48.570 --> 20:52.810]  And I don't necessarily think any form of technology is a bad thing.
[20:53.050 --> 20:55.710]  I just think that it firmly needs to be in the user's control.
[20:55.990 --> 20:59.950]  Uh, one other thing worth pointing out is you don't have to opt in.
[21:00.290 --> 21:02.530]  The software on your phone has to opt in.
[21:04.010 --> 21:10.270]  And we all know that software is, uh, sometimes doesn't always do exactly what it's supposed to.
[21:10.550 --> 21:11.710]  Yeah, you notice that, huh?
[21:12.430 --> 21:13.710]  That certainly is true.
[21:15.010 --> 21:17.150]  Okay, here's, uh, here's something else.
[21:17.150 --> 21:23.750]  Uh, and this actually speaks to something that is in your latest column in the new issue of, uh, 2600, which is not yet out, but will be soon.
[21:23.750 --> 21:26.890]  Uh, this comes from our re, our listener, Dan.
[21:27.090 --> 21:30.650]  Uh, he says, how would you like your mobile calls deliberately blocked?
[21:30.770 --> 21:31.530]  He's not threatening us.
[21:31.570 --> 21:35.710]  He's, uh, he's, he's reporting on something that has been in the news a bit lately.
[21:36.170 --> 21:46.410]  That's, um, exactly what AT&T slash singular is doing to people who try to use freeconference.com, which is a free, but very good teleconferencing service.
[21:46.590 --> 21:50.050]  A deliberate block on all calls to this service has been put in place.
[21:50.050 --> 21:53.430]  And the question is, are other providers going to follow suit?
[21:53.790 --> 22:04.830]  Now, uh, the story is, uh, AT&T singular has begun blocking access to a free conference calling service as of last week, claiming that such services are costing the wireless giant millions in rerouting and termination fees.
[22:05.030 --> 22:10.290]  Uh, AT&T singular users have been reporting that they no longer can dial into some free conference calling services.
[22:10.770 --> 22:20.010]  And spokesperson Mark Siegel has said the reason the company has decided to start, uh, start blocking these services is because high volumes of calls to similar services are costly.
[22:20.110 --> 22:23.630]  And the cost for those calls aren't passed on to the consumer.
[22:23.990 --> 22:27.610]  Uh, we have to pay terminating access for every minute the person is on the line.
[22:27.810 --> 22:31.770]  Typically these companies run them through local exchange companies that charge high access rates.
[22:31.850 --> 22:34.230]  So we end up paying high access charges.
[22:34.950 --> 22:38.110]  And, um, apparently there's some kind of Iowa connection here.
[22:38.210 --> 22:41.010]  Profit, maybe you can fill us in as to what Iowa has to do with all this.
[22:41.690 --> 22:42.450]  Yes, certainly.
[22:42.930 --> 22:46.890]  Well, uh, you know, the, the two words that I have to say are crocodile tears.
[22:47.150 --> 22:58.090]  Um, since, uh, you know, the, the, uh, wireless phone companies certainly have no problem, uh, selling you unlimited nights and weekends and free long distance, uh, when you're paying them money.
[22:58.170 --> 23:08.470]  But then when it comes to actually delivering the service, uh, you know, well, if it's too expensive, uh, and you're not using it exactly the way that they intended, uh, then they feel like it's their right to block you.
[23:09.210 --> 23:11.650]  Um, Singular's actively doing this.
[23:11.770 --> 23:15.570]  There've been, uh, news reports that, uh, Sprint is doing it as well.
[23:15.830 --> 23:23.790]  Um, I have a Sprint handset that I've tested this on and, and I haven't been able to reproduce it on Sprint, although I have been able to reproduce the problem on Singular.
[23:24.530 --> 23:31.410]  Um, basically, uh, the access charges, um, that, uh, that you referenced are at the heart of all of this.
[23:31.610 --> 23:45.930]  And what access charges are, because a lot of people aren't familiar with them, it's, um, it's, when you make a long distance call, you pay a certain amount per minute, or you have a certain number of minutes that are bundled with your wireless, uh, phone plan,
[23:46.030 --> 23:50.750]  or maybe you get unlimited minutes, uh, after, you know, 7 PM or 9 PM or whatnot.
[23:51.350 --> 24:02.570]  And so the cost of the, the actual cost of the long distance call is abstracted to you because you pay a flat rate per minute, or you pay a flat rate for some bucket of minutes.
[24:02.870 --> 24:15.390]  But on the back end, there's this incredibly insanely complicated system because nothing is, makes any sense or is simple with phone companies that the telecommunications carriers use.
[24:15.690 --> 24:22.550]  And, uh, that this determines how much they pay on the back end for a long distance call.
[24:22.750 --> 24:29.050]  So it can be as little as, uh, under one penny a minute for a call from, say, Seattle to New York.
[24:29.570 --> 24:38.310]  Um, or it can be as high as, you know, 20 or 30 cents a minute for a call to say, ADAC, Alaska, which is all the way at the edge of America.
[24:38.310 --> 24:41.530]  And I wrote about in my last column, um, for 2600.
[24:42.770 --> 24:45.370]  And Iowa is somewhere in the middle of those extremes.
[24:45.710 --> 24:55.110]  Uh, if you go to some of the rural parts of Iowa, the, the termination charges to there can be up to, um, 11 or 12 cents per minute.
[24:55.330 --> 24:57.010]  So what does that mean to you?
[24:57.330 --> 25:11.230]  Well, nothing, because if you're making a call to Iowa, it costs you exactly the same as if you're making a call to Los Angeles or Miami or Chicago or, uh, uh, uh, you know, Garrison, Utah, another area with extremely high access charges, uh, on the back end,
[25:11.310 --> 25:12.450]  but it all costs you the same.
[25:12.550 --> 25:15.510]  And so what the phone companies do is they price their calls.
[25:15.510 --> 25:20.650]  So they lose money on some of them and they make a lot of money on the vast majority of them.
[25:20.650 --> 25:28.510]  Um, and in the end, um, it's pretty much a wash and they're able to package their minutes, um, in a very easy and understandable way for consumers.
[25:29.190 --> 25:43.350]  Um, so a couple of entrepreneurial companies, and this is not a new idea, this stretches back for almost 20 years, have, uh, set up various services in parts of Iowa that have high, uh, termination charges.
[25:43.630 --> 25:55.610]  And so what they'll do is they'll make a deal with the phone company in Iowa to give them a kickback of, you know, some number of cents per minute out of what they receive from the long distance carriers who terminate calls there.
[25:55.850 --> 25:59.630]  And freeconference.com is, is an example of one of those services.
[25:59.630 --> 26:11.510]  You can go on their website, you can set up a conference call and all you pay for is an ordinary long distance call, no extra charges to some dinky little town you've never heard of in the middle of nowhere in Iowa.
[26:11.510 --> 26:14.450]  Hey, and we probably have listeners there, so no offense, Iowans.
[26:15.030 --> 26:20.070]  Uh, yeah, no offense to all, any of you Iowegians, as the Nebraskans call you.
[26:21.090 --> 26:22.750]  Well, let me just quickly ask you a question, though.
[26:22.950 --> 26:29.270]  Uh, these termination fees that, uh, for some reason are higher in Iowa and, and parts of Utah, uh, why is that?
[26:29.310 --> 26:34.490]  Is it just, uh, something they decide to do on a whim, or is there some kind of reason why there are higher termination charges?
[26:34.950 --> 26:35.890]  Oh, good question.
[26:35.890 --> 26:37.970]  Well, it's actually not just Iowa and Utah.
[26:38.190 --> 26:39.530]  There's, uh, parts of Nebraska.
[26:39.870 --> 26:44.810]  There's a, you know, there's, there's rural areas all over the country that have higher termination fees than urban areas.
[26:44.990 --> 26:49.410]  And the, uh, principle behind that is, uh, called universal service.
[26:49.690 --> 27:00.990]  And so, basically, it costs a lot more to provide telephone service in very rural areas, um, than it does to provide telephone service in urban areas.
[27:01.130 --> 27:12.610]  And so, in order to allow you to have that phone line in a very small town like Spencer, Iowa for $20 a month, uh, which would be the regulated rate roughly.
[27:13.430 --> 27:15.710]  Um, that's actually not real.
[27:15.870 --> 27:19.770]  It actually costs considerably more than that for you to have that phone.
[27:19.890 --> 27:29.150]  And so, um, what these carriers will do is they have very high termination charges that are set by, um, a government agency.
[27:29.770 --> 27:38.390]  And those termination charges go into a fund, which then help make up their losses on providing, um, regulated phone services to you.
[27:38.570 --> 27:44.270]  Uh, there's, they're free to sell unregulated services like freeway calling and voicemail and so forth on top of that.
[27:44.390 --> 27:55.810]  And they do make money on those, but on the basic line charge, um, typically carriers will, will, uh, very much lose money on those, uh, on, on every single line they have in service.
[27:55.950 --> 28:05.110]  So, so basically what's happening here is that, uh, some of the phone companies are getting a little bit impatient, saying, uh, all these people are calling these, these high termination, uh, fee numbers and there's no reason.
[28:05.370 --> 28:08.490]  I mean, is it legal for them to, to, uh, to block access like that?
[28:09.230 --> 28:10.530]  It's absolutely legal.
[28:10.690 --> 28:23.150]  It's, it's absolutely legal for small carriers in Iowa to set up services and, uh, and maintain their high termination charges because basically the contracts that they have with the long distance companies say, if you terminate calls on our network, you pay this much per minute.
[28:23.790 --> 28:24.870]  Um, it's...
[28:24.870 --> 28:28.930]  But is it legal for companies like AT&T to, to block access to this?
[28:29.110 --> 28:31.070]  What about universal access to all phone numbers?
[28:31.670 --> 28:33.170]  It absolutely is.
[28:33.310 --> 28:37.130]  Um, in, depending on the contract that you have with them.
[28:37.270 --> 28:45.050]  So in this specific case of singular, uh, blocking long distance calls, they have a very one-sided contract with you.
[28:45.130 --> 28:55.930]  And if you, I don't know how many people have actually read their mobile phone contract, but you could distill it all down into a, we can do whatever we want and you have no recourse.
[28:55.930 --> 28:58.670]  And if you don't like it, pay the early termination fee.
[28:58.850 --> 29:07.930]  Um, and if you had those three lines in the contract and that was it, then it would more or less be the same as what, you know, the four pages of debts legally say.
[29:08.710 --> 29:11.450]  Um, AT&T changed their contract.
[29:11.690 --> 29:18.970]  We'll say AT&T owns singular and singular recently changed its contract to say that you can only use a singular phone for a call to a single party.
[29:19.870 --> 29:21.210]  And that's all it's intended.
[29:21.210 --> 29:21.710]  Really?
[29:21.850 --> 29:22.990]  So they, they made that change.
[29:23.130 --> 29:25.610]  You can only call a single party on a, on a phone call.
[29:25.850 --> 29:27.850]  If someone calls us, you're on a conference call.
[29:27.970 --> 29:28.070]  Yeah.
[29:28.130 --> 29:29.530]  What was someone calls the radio station?
[29:29.690 --> 29:31.470]  They're talking to several people here.
[29:31.930 --> 29:32.190]  Yeah.
[29:32.250 --> 29:33.390]  Somebody calls a radio station.
[29:33.590 --> 29:35.090]  They're violating their terms of service.
[29:35.390 --> 29:44.930]  Uh, it pre, they didn't exempt their own three-way calling service from this terms of service or presumably if you pay them double minutes to make a three-way call, you're violating the terms of service.
[29:44.930 --> 29:46.510]  I'm not quite sure how that works.
[29:47.030 --> 29:55.190]  Uh, you know, if I call my car, a conference room at work, um, you know, that's evidently, uh, uh, you know, violating the terms of service as well.
[29:55.330 --> 30:09.090]  Well, I'm glad we learned this because they're certainly, if they call, if anybody with AT&T or singular calls this radio station now, 212-209-2900, you're violating the terms of your, uh, agreement because not only are you talking to all the people in this room and profit on the phone,
[30:09.150 --> 30:12.450]  uh, you're talking to millions of people listening at the same time.
[30:12.590 --> 30:15.130]  And I'm sure that the phone company wants a cut of that somehow.
[30:15.530 --> 30:15.770]  I'm glad.
[30:16.130 --> 30:16.150]  Yeah.
[30:16.230 --> 30:21.470]  Well, you know, if I call my aunt and uncle, they pick up, uh, you know, my aunt picks up one extension in the house.
[30:21.570 --> 30:22.750]  My uncle picks up the other one.
[30:22.790 --> 30:23.530]  I talked to him both.
[30:23.570 --> 30:25.850]  I'd be violating the terms of service for that too, presumably.
[30:26.090 --> 30:28.770]  So, I mean, it's, it's the most ridiculous term I've ever seen.
[30:28.910 --> 30:36.750]  But again, with these wireless contracts, they can change them anytime and you don't have any recourse, but to pay the early termination fee.
[30:37.010 --> 30:42.470]  And if you don't like whatever ridiculous terms they have, well, you know, your recourse is not to use their service.
[30:42.670 --> 30:56.370]  So, um, you know, this is a thoroughly unregulated service except by the contract that you signed with them, which is so one-sided as to, you know, give singular pretty much complete power over who your phone can call and where.
[30:56.570 --> 30:56.750]  Okay.
[30:56.790 --> 31:00.450]  So, so you're saying, you're saying that this is, this is a wireless issue.
[31:00.590 --> 31:08.510]  This is not something that, uh, uh, wired phone lines, uh, still have some degree of, uh, guarantee that they're going to connect to other phone numbers.
[31:09.190 --> 31:16.550]  Well, again, that gets down to the tariff that they've filed and some services are tariffed and some aren't.
[31:16.930 --> 31:27.070]  So, um, you know, voice over IP services, uh, if you use a Comcast or Cox for your voice, um, you know, that, that may be wired, but it's completely unregulated.
[31:27.290 --> 31:38.270]  The only thing that's regulated is certain types of not flat rate, unlimited packages from long distance carriers serving your landline.
[31:39.050 --> 31:43.630]  Say I made a phone call to one single person and the FBI was tapping my phone.
[31:43.810 --> 31:45.910]  Would I be breaching my contract?
[31:46.270 --> 31:48.190]  Oh, you know, this is getting a little silly.
[31:48.510 --> 31:55.950]  Uh, the, the, the, the point is that, uh, for some reason, and, and maybe, maybe profit, we can conclude by just saying what the reason is.
[31:56.570 --> 32:01.050]  Wireless contracts or wireless phone service is a complete, uh, it's, it's anarchy.
[32:01.150 --> 32:02.230]  It's not regulated at all.
[32:02.370 --> 32:12.490]  Whereas, uh, your, your landline with Verizon or Bell South or whoever, uh, that comes under the jurisdiction of the public service commission, public utilities commission, whatever it's called in your state.
[32:12.690 --> 32:14.190]  Uh, how did it get this way?
[32:15.170 --> 32:27.170]  Well, uh, you can boil that down to Michael Powell and, uh, many of his predecessors who take a very, um, uh, loose regulatory approach to new telecommunication services.
[32:27.170 --> 32:32.890]  And, you know, it's worth pointing out that, uh, wireless phone service isn't the only thing that's this way.
[32:33.150 --> 32:36.710]  If you look at your DSL service, that's probably unregulated.
[32:36.710 --> 32:38.930]  If you have a cable modem, that's unregulated.
[32:39.070 --> 32:42.690]  If you have anything other than basic cable service, that's unregulated.
[32:42.810 --> 32:50.110]  And we've kind of moved to a marketplace where companies have a great deal of power over what services they provide you and what they charge.
[32:50.330 --> 33:03.150]  And, you know, this is, it's, it's a double-edged sword because, um, giving the flexibility to not have a lot of governmental regulation around that has enabled the communications marketplace, to move as quickly as it has.
[33:03.250 --> 33:10.250]  And I think that it's, you know, by and large led to lower prices than we would otherwise have in a highly regulated marketplace.
[33:10.750 --> 33:17.070]  Um, on the other hand, you know, when it comes down to things like this, it's one of those, well, that ought to be illegal, um, cases.
[33:17.490 --> 33:20.430]  But, you know, again, I, I have faith in the market.
[33:21.130 --> 33:35.450]  If everybody knows that singular is abusing, uh, this right that they have in their contract, you know, would you sign up for singular service, uh, knowing that, uh, if they decide that they don't like who you're calling, or that it costs them too much to provide that service,
[33:35.650 --> 33:37.090]  they might just block your calls.
[33:37.690 --> 33:43.350]  Uh, you know, I wouldn't, I, I expect reliable phone service from a company that I trust, and that certainly isn't singular.
[33:43.810 --> 33:47.110]  See, I don't think that works because there's, uh, no companies that I trust.
[33:47.110 --> 33:48.850]  All the companies have the same deal.
[33:49.110 --> 34:02.950]  Uh, you know, there, there's a, a sort of monopsony power where very few companies set all the rules and even without explicit collusion among them, they basically end up with the same deal and it's not a good deal for the consumer.
[34:03.210 --> 34:04.270]  So then what's the alternative?
[34:05.250 --> 34:07.490]  Well, one of the alternatives is regulation.
[34:07.730 --> 34:08.870]  There's, there's others.
[34:08.990 --> 34:10.510]  But I mean, it's for the consumer right now.
[34:10.790 --> 34:14.370]  Uh, well, the other alternative is to, to not have a mobile phone.
[34:14.450 --> 34:19.730]  See, I, I, well, I would say, uh, you, you, you strike at the company that does something bad like this.
[34:19.910 --> 34:23.350]  And if everybody who had AT&T and singular just said, you know what?
[34:23.430 --> 34:25.710]  I'm, I'm switching from you guys because of this.
[34:25.810 --> 34:28.850]  And if a lot of people did that, the other companies would get the message.
[34:29.150 --> 34:29.830]  Don't do that.
[34:30.170 --> 34:36.830]  And I think that's an important, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's a silly, uh, it's a silly thing for the, for a communications provider to do.
[34:37.090 --> 34:41.210]  Why do you have a mobile phone to make phone calls to people that you want to call?
[34:41.370 --> 34:44.090]  If they can't deliver that service, then what are you paying them for?
[34:44.890 --> 34:45.250]  Exactly.
[34:45.430 --> 34:45.650]  Exactly.
[34:45.970 --> 35:00.610]  One of the other interesting, we spent a lot of time on this, but one of the other interesting things is the parallels to the net neutrality debate and, uh, that this singular is doing with phones exactly what we are trying to stop them from doing with the internet,
[35:00.830 --> 35:03.370]  which is to select who you may connect to.
[35:03.990 --> 35:18.450]  And, uh, you know, AT&T of course says this is silly in, in this news article that, uh, that they're quoted in, but it's, it really raises the specter that this, these companies, a very small number of companies control who you can connect to.
[35:19.150 --> 35:24.930]  And it would be much better if they did not exercise or did not have that control.
[35:25.970 --> 35:35.550]  Uh, you know, the, I guess the day is coming where, uh, one of these companies can say they don't like us, you know, they can just block BAI from being connected to, or block one of us individually.
[35:35.810 --> 35:39.150]  If they say you don't pay your bill, then, Hey, guess what?
[35:39.210 --> 35:41.170]  You can't get any phone calls from anybody, you know?
[35:41.470 --> 35:45.170]  And it doesn't have to be the bill for that phone because they could just disconnect that phone, I suppose.
[35:45.390 --> 35:50.030]  But, uh, anything with your name on it, you can be blacklisted from AT&T or any particular cell phone company.
[35:50.170 --> 35:50.830]  It's, it's fascinating.
[35:51.030 --> 35:52.310]  And it's, it's kind of scary as well.
[35:52.610 --> 35:52.910]  Okay.
[35:53.110 --> 35:55.570]  Uh, 212-209-2900 is our phone number.
[35:55.730 --> 35:59.670]  We're opening up the phone lines, uh, in just a couple of minutes.
[35:59.810 --> 36:04.870]  So, uh, call back if you get disconnected because of the greedy phone companies that like to disconnect you after a few rings.
[36:05.430 --> 36:06.630]  Yeah, we know about that too.
[36:07.090 --> 36:10.470]  Uh, here's, uh, a letter from one of our listeners.
[36:10.670 --> 36:14.570]  Hey, everybody over at 2600 and love off the hook, off the wall, the magazine, et cetera, et cetera.
[36:14.910 --> 36:18.410]  I've been meaning to write about this story for a while now and just didn't get around to it.
[36:18.670 --> 36:22.990]  A few weeks ago, Emmanuel, you got a call on off the wall about school lockdown drills.
[36:23.150 --> 36:25.970]  I know you keep the show separate, but this applies to off the hook.
[36:26.090 --> 36:30.970]  In my town of Clarksville, Tennessee, one of the high schools, Clarksville high school, what do they call the other one?
[36:31.410 --> 36:33.310]  I mean, why does that one get the name Clarksville high school?
[36:33.350 --> 36:35.410]  It could be Clarksville South if it's the second school.
[36:35.570 --> 36:39.510]  I just bet there's a lot of, uh, you know, a lot of hostility because of the name thing going on.
[36:39.590 --> 36:55.270]  But anyway, uh, Clarksville high school had one of these drills while this drill was going on without telling any students, something like 30 to 50 police and nine to 15 dogs came apparently together and searched the school and students cars for weapons,
[36:55.570 --> 36:57.170]  drugs, and whatever else they were looking for.
[36:57.590 --> 37:03.470]  Finally, when the drill was over, students came out and were then notified all their lockers and lots of their cars had been searched.
[37:03.910 --> 37:05.730]  Uh, I'd like to know how they got into the cars.
[37:05.930 --> 37:12.130]  Uh, whatever was found that was incriminating was used to press charges on anyone that had illegal paraphernalia.
[37:12.270 --> 37:17.510]  I just thought you'd like to know about another civil authority misleading people and abusing power, signed Mike.
[37:17.730 --> 37:19.410]  And, uh, that's, uh, that's kind of scary.
[37:19.570 --> 37:20.250]  You think that's scary, Jim?
[37:20.630 --> 37:20.750]  Yeah.
[37:21.030 --> 37:23.690]  Unfortunately, the Supreme Court has ruled that's legal.
[37:24.210 --> 37:24.870]  That's legal.
[37:25.010 --> 37:26.170]  It's on the school property.
[37:26.730 --> 37:30.350]  What's in the lockers is technically, you know, it's in possession of the school, so.
[37:30.350 --> 37:31.170]  Wass, in the cars?
[37:31.290 --> 37:32.230]  They can brick into people's cars?
[37:32.490 --> 37:35.230]  The parking lots that's supplied by the school.
[37:35.390 --> 37:36.110]  It's school property.
[37:36.470 --> 37:36.690]  Yeah.
[37:37.090 --> 37:43.490]  It's- well, I don't know if they're allowed to actually go into your car or not, but if they bring drug-sniffing dogs around that's that's just as suitable.
[37:43.870 --> 37:46.130]  Can I search people's cars, who park in my driveway?
[37:46.630 --> 37:46.950]  Oh, yeah.
[37:47.410 --> 37:47.870]  I can?
[37:48.070 --> 37:48.230]  Yeah.
[37:48.370 --> 37:52.910]  Well, you, you- you can't necessarily go into the car, but you can certainly look into the car.
[37:53.050 --> 37:55.910]  And if you have a drug-sniffing dog, you can send it around the car.
[37:56.030 --> 37:56.150]  Sure.
[37:56.290 --> 37:57.850]  Well, there- I can get a drug-sniffing dog.
[37:57.850 --> 38:06.290]  If you look in and you see marijuana cigarettes or firearms and you're a police officer, you then have probable cause because, gee, it's in plain sight.
[38:06.490 --> 38:07.150]  You know, you can.
[38:07.330 --> 38:15.090]  Parents can rent a drug-sniffing dog for an hour on a weekday evening to sniff out their... or afternoon while their children are in school.
[38:15.470 --> 38:16.130]  Why not weekends?
[38:16.350 --> 38:16.950]  Is this so?
[38:17.090 --> 38:21.810]  Well, I'm going to say one thing that's completely far-fetched and crazy every week and see if people catch it.
[38:21.910 --> 38:23.070]  And this week was easy.
[38:23.190 --> 38:24.430]  This week I'm admitting it.
[38:24.430 --> 38:25.430]  But, yeah.
[38:25.690 --> 38:28.890]  In a few years, though, I'm sure we'll play back this show and it'll be normal.
[38:29.050 --> 38:33.010]  Oddly enough, in Japan, you can rent a dog to take it for a walk for $15 an hour.
[38:33.410 --> 38:34.950]  Yeah, that's not nearly as scary, though.
[38:35.770 --> 38:37.230]  Okay, what else do we have here?
[38:38.890 --> 38:47.050]  Okay, this person writes in in response to the listener who called in last week about webcasting Channel 4 over in London.
[38:47.230 --> 38:48.550]  I was trying to do this the other day.
[38:48.550 --> 38:51.930]  I found a UK proxy on a list which actually worked for me.
[38:51.930 --> 38:54.770]  Most of them complained that they'd only work if I was on a certain academic network.
[38:55.090 --> 38:56.930]  But it was too slow for broadband TV.
[38:57.670 --> 39:06.610]  One used to be able to get proxy lists from the headers of spam and spam reports on the Usenet group news.admin.net-abuse.cightings.
[39:07.350 --> 39:10.230]  The only thing of value in the spam was the headers.
[39:10.630 --> 39:16.090]  Most of the spammers now seem to be using remote-controlled Trojans on PCs instead of open proxies on big servers.
[39:16.090 --> 39:23.090]  I can tell this is probably what's going on when I'm told about how some penny stock is going to explode and it comes from an end-user IP in Poland.
[39:23.330 --> 39:29.070]  And 10 minutes later, I get the same bovine excrement from an end-user IP in Malaysia.
[39:29.890 --> 39:36.490]  At one point, this is brilliant, all the schools in South Korea got broadband and they were all installed by the Ministry of Education.
[39:36.490 --> 39:40.310]  And all the schools got open squid proxies on port 8080.
[39:40.670 --> 39:46.170]  So you'd get porno spam from the North Inshin Girls Elementary School.
[39:48.510 --> 39:49.470]  True story.
[39:50.070 --> 39:50.550]  Unreal.
[39:50.990 --> 39:52.210]  Okay, here's a letter.
[39:52.410 --> 39:54.030]  And then we're going to take the phones right after that.
[39:54.110 --> 39:55.290]  212-209-2900.
[39:57.330 --> 40:00.110]  I just caught what I thought was a live show on Rant Radio.
[40:00.410 --> 40:00.870]  I'm not sure.
[40:01.050 --> 40:01.990]  Are we on Rant Radio?
[40:02.210 --> 40:04.650]  But anyway, after seeing the 2600 page, I believe I'm mistaken.
[40:04.650 --> 40:07.310]  I guess our show pops up in all sorts of places.
[40:07.730 --> 40:10.810]  Someone called in asking about using cell phones in airplanes.
[40:11.090 --> 40:13.230]  And someone else conferenced in on the call.
[40:13.410 --> 40:15.010]  First-time listener, sorry for lack of names.
[40:15.450 --> 40:18.930]  Who said with very little confidence that it might be possible, but most likely not.
[40:19.330 --> 40:24.150]  I'd just like to send in a quick correction based on personal experience with slight technical hacking.
[40:24.970 --> 40:31.470]  I oftentimes fly between LAX and YVR airports going from Southern California to Vancouver, Canada.
[40:31.990 --> 40:34.450]  On these flights, myself and my father share a laptop.
[40:34.650 --> 40:37.870]  In which we have a Verizon wireless, CDMA wireless internet card.
[40:38.190 --> 40:42.950]  As long as we're by the window, we have no problem browsing the web the whole trip up.
[40:43.430 --> 40:46.570]  Though the speeds are far slower than what would be experienced on the ground.
[40:46.830 --> 40:49.330]  The reality is, you can use cell phones in airplanes.
[40:49.710 --> 40:51.230]  Though being near the window helps.
[40:51.350 --> 40:58.510]  And the reason they tell you to turn your cell phones off during flights has nothing to do with interfering with airline radio and communication equipment.
[40:58.510 --> 41:02.790]  But rather, that just having your phone on taxes the cellular networks incredibly.
[41:03.150 --> 41:05.410]  If everyone in the air over the U.S.
[41:05.410 --> 41:16.470]  and Canada were to leave their phones on during their flights, it would all but completely crash the network due to the constant handoffs between towers, which while flying, a tower is held for at most five or six seconds.
[41:18.710 --> 41:21.550]  Well, thanks, Rob, for sending in the details on that.
[41:21.610 --> 41:25.990]  Now, I know, Redbird, you're chomping at the bit to reply to this.
[41:26.190 --> 41:35.510]  Well, I did reply to him personally, but I have a slightly different perspective on this matter in that I'm a pilot and I've been flying in planes where my cell phone's been on in the cockpit.
[41:35.690 --> 41:37.670]  Now, you haven't been a pilot the whole time you've been on the air.
[41:37.790 --> 41:38.830]  You've recently become a pilot.
[41:38.890 --> 41:39.050]  Recently, yes.
[41:39.050 --> 41:40.390]  So this is a new perspective you have.
[41:40.390 --> 41:41.270]  It's a new perspective.
[41:41.470 --> 41:41.630]  Okay.
[41:42.110 --> 41:48.530]  To be honest, I probably would have had a very similar opinion to his back before I had these experiences.
[41:48.530 --> 41:52.210]  But I have left my cell phone on in the cockpit of a plane.
[41:52.410 --> 42:06.550]  And the avionics, actually the audio amplifier stage of the avionics, I should be more specific, is just as susceptible to cell phone interference as any amplified speaker that you'll find around your house in your stereo or in your television set or whatever.
[42:06.550 --> 42:12.430]  And on some of these, the gain stage, the gain at that stage is fixed.
[42:12.470 --> 42:14.910]  So the interference is actually very, very loud.
[42:15.030 --> 42:16.190]  What kind of interference are we talking about?
[42:16.950 --> 42:18.450]  Typical GSM noise that you'll hear.
[42:18.890 --> 42:19.910]  That GSM beeping noise?
[42:20.070 --> 42:20.350]  Yes.
[42:20.350 --> 42:21.070]  It's kind of, yes.
[42:21.130 --> 42:23.350]  It's just a very annoying sort of beep noise.
[42:23.530 --> 42:27.610]  I'm assuming that you're in a small plane where you're right in front of the actual avionics.
[42:27.610 --> 42:29.790]  If you're in a large jet, do you think...
[42:29.790 --> 42:34.830]  I've been in jet cockpits as well when the avionics are on.
[42:34.830 --> 42:41.510]  And from the passenger section, with the cockpit door open at least, I was able to hear the interference.
[42:41.670 --> 42:43.650]  They led you into a cockpit of a commercial airliner?
[42:43.790 --> 42:45.590]  It was a privately owned jet.
[42:45.750 --> 42:45.990]  Okay.
[42:46.190 --> 42:46.330]  Yeah.
[42:46.610 --> 42:47.230]  So, okay.
[42:47.310 --> 42:50.430]  So what you're saying is that if you are the pilot, then the noise...
[42:50.430 --> 42:52.670]  Is it just GSM that causes this interference or...
[42:52.670 --> 42:54.130]  I mean, any type of...
[42:54.130 --> 42:55.230]  Any protocol will do it, yeah.
[42:55.450 --> 42:55.590]  Uh-huh.
[42:55.710 --> 43:02.730]  It's specifically the susceptibility of that stage of the amplifier to receiving this interference.
[43:02.730 --> 43:05.070]  So it's just an audible thing, or does it...
[43:05.070 --> 43:06.410]  It comes through the headsets.
[43:06.550 --> 43:08.930]  It comes through the overhead speakers if they're on.
[43:09.110 --> 43:09.390]  Uh-huh.
[43:09.490 --> 43:12.170]  But yeah, it's definitely susceptible to that.
[43:12.450 --> 43:15.610]  The RF stages of the radios aren't necessarily susceptible.
[43:16.470 --> 43:16.910]  It's...
[43:16.910 --> 43:20.930]  The frequency range is completely different, and it's definitely out of the bandpass filters and all that stuff.
[43:21.050 --> 43:24.130]  But the audio stage is definitely susceptible to that.
[43:24.130 --> 43:24.870]  And it's...
[43:25.370 --> 43:28.550]  Once you've heard it in the...
[43:28.550 --> 43:34.930]  When you're actually trying to communicate with, like, air traffic control or something, and you have to ask for repeats, it's just really frustrating.
[43:35.090 --> 43:37.250]  And if you were in an emergency, it would really be a problem.
[43:37.350 --> 43:39.090]  Now, this is your cell phone that's interfering?
[43:39.110 --> 43:40.330]  My cell phone has interfered with it.
[43:40.330 --> 43:41.010]  So why don't you turn it off?
[43:41.030 --> 43:42.330]  I do turn it off now, yeah.
[43:42.450 --> 43:46.190]  Well, you broadcast an announcement asking yourself to turn it off, and you turn it off at that point.
[43:46.950 --> 43:47.790]  So, yeah, okay.
[43:47.890 --> 43:56.210]  Now, I mean, coming from firsthand experience like this, and if there are any airplane pilots out there, you know, commercial airlines, maybe there are stories they can share as well.
[43:57.310 --> 44:00.090]  I've talked to a bunch about this, and they have the same experiences.
[44:00.090 --> 44:04.030]  And I would venture to say that if you're in the back of the plane, you're probably not causing any problems.
[44:04.330 --> 44:06.930]  But if you were up closer to the cockpit door, it might be possible.
[44:07.050 --> 44:10.030]  And for the sake of safety, I would just say turn them off.
[44:10.130 --> 44:15.770]  But they're talking about, and I'm not in favor of this, but they're talking about allowing cell phones on airplanes now.
[44:15.770 --> 44:17.970]  So they must have figured out some way of preventing this.
[44:18.130 --> 44:23.530]  Well, one of the problems is that the signal strength is very low inside of an airplane because you're basically, you're very well shielded.
[44:23.590 --> 44:28.370]  And so the cell phone automatically turns its RF stage to the highest power level that it has.
[44:28.550 --> 44:34.410]  And that really, really doesn't help when it comes to the avionics picking up interference.
[44:34.690 --> 44:38.150]  I mean, when the cell phone's on the lowest power setting, it probably won't cause a problem.
[44:38.170 --> 44:41.270]  And that would be the case if there was actually a cell site on the plane itself.
[44:41.490 --> 44:47.910]  But other than that, you're in a very well shielded environment, and your phone is probably at the highest power level at that point.
[44:48.030 --> 44:57.030]  Now, in addition, though, what our listeners said, do you think that also holds true that you also mess up the networks of the cellular companies by constantly switching on and off?
[44:57.610 --> 44:59.290]  You can ask the prophet this question.
[44:59.370 --> 45:01.990]  He would probably know more about the specifics of that.
[45:02.090 --> 45:09.770]  But it's definitely tolling the network because you're attempting to associate with cell sites that aren't anywhere near each other.
[45:09.770 --> 45:11.330]  And there's all sorts of...
[45:11.330 --> 45:12.370]  We'll let the prophet...
[45:12.370 --> 45:12.790]  Yes, prophet.
[45:12.950 --> 45:13.950]  Any input on this?
[45:14.310 --> 45:14.790]  Yeah.
[45:14.970 --> 45:17.110]  Well, I back up everything that he just said.
[45:17.110 --> 45:19.290]  First of all, he's absolutely right.
[45:19.990 --> 45:23.730]  CDMA handsets should not cause any interference at the audio stage.
[45:24.350 --> 45:28.010]  But you will have that problem with GSM and with IDEN, absolutely.
[45:28.650 --> 45:31.550]  It's just because of the burstable nature of the communications.
[45:32.530 --> 45:36.230]  And so, yeah, keep your wireless phones off in an airplane, please.
[45:36.230 --> 45:58.090]  But as far as the network side, when you're sitting in a plane at, you know, 30,000 feet and you hit every tower that you can see from 30,000 feet with a full 0.3 watts, which is, you know, the maximum transmit on most CDMA handsets, it's not good for the network.
[45:58.090 --> 45:59.690]  And it's also not scalable.
[45:59.970 --> 46:07.390]  You may be able to handle it with, you know, a 1X RTT or an EVDO data connection, you know, in one instance on one plane.
[46:07.650 --> 46:15.910]  But if you try to scale that out to, you know, like half the passengers on every plane up and down the West Coast, I mean, you'd pretty much not have a working cellular network.
[46:16.570 --> 46:29.190]  What the solution that's been implemented in order to allow the use of cell phones on planes is it's a microcell that's actually inside the aircraft.
[46:29.810 --> 46:38.290]  And they've done this for CDMA, but not for GSM because of the interference with any sort of microphone in the area.
[46:38.530 --> 46:40.870]  I mean, you know, it can interfere with headphones, too.
[46:41.050 --> 46:42.130]  So, I mean, keep that in mind.
[46:43.350 --> 46:56.250]  And what it'll do is it just basically you can hit that with the absolute lowest power level on your handset, and then it relays the communications, you know, via satellite back down to an earth station.
[46:56.410 --> 46:58.930]  So, it works pretty much the same way that the air phone does today.
[46:59.230 --> 46:59.590]  Okay.
[46:59.730 --> 47:03.130]  We have a lot of information tonight and very interesting stuff.
[47:03.430 --> 47:03.790]  Okay.
[47:03.850 --> 47:04.590]  We're going to take phone calls.
[47:04.670 --> 47:06.070]  212-209-2900.
[47:06.210 --> 47:07.770]  Let's try and get through as many as we can.
[47:08.810 --> 47:09.590]  And good evening.
[47:09.790 --> 47:10.410]  You're on Off the Hook.
[47:10.850 --> 47:11.210]  Yes.
[47:11.730 --> 47:12.490]  What's on your mind?
[47:12.490 --> 47:13.990]  Oh, I have a question.
[47:14.270 --> 47:20.330]  Is it possible to text message a phone from a home computer on DSL?
[47:20.810 --> 47:21.250]  Sure.
[47:21.710 --> 47:22.690]  How do you do that?
[47:22.970 --> 47:25.070]  There are a bunch of SMS gateway services.
[47:25.230 --> 47:29.550]  The one that's probably the most popular is just the AOL Instant Messaging service.
[47:30.410 --> 47:31.230]  What's it called?
[47:31.430 --> 47:32.590]  Just AOL Instant Messaging.
[47:32.690 --> 47:33.410]  You probably use it now.
[47:34.010 --> 47:34.330]  AOL?
[47:34.550 --> 47:35.110]  AOL.
[47:35.290 --> 47:35.850]  AOL.
[47:36.210 --> 47:36.890]  Americanology, okay.
[47:37.250 --> 47:43.470]  And anyway, you can send an IM to just plus one, you know, and then the area code and phone number.
[47:43.710 --> 47:46.610]  Actually, I should point out, Redbird, you were instrumental in teaching me about this.
[47:46.710 --> 47:54.550]  When I was on the Trans-Siberian Express back in 2005, I was sending you a text message and you were replying on a computer.
[47:54.550 --> 47:56.950]  You were getting it as an AOL Instant Message.
[47:57.130 --> 48:02.750]  So I was blown away by the fact that almost as soon as I hit send, you'd have a reply from me.
[48:02.850 --> 48:04.230]  I'd get a reply within 10 seconds.
[48:04.330 --> 48:11.210]  So we were able to carry on kind of a one-sided conversation where I was slow and you were fast, but we sent quite a few text messages.
[48:11.210 --> 48:17.090]  By the way, I got the bill for that, and it turns out it's kind of expensive to send a lot of text messages from a train in Russia.
[48:17.290 --> 48:19.190]  But, yeah, you can do it.
[48:19.250 --> 48:21.570]  And it's... how would he set this up?
[48:22.070 --> 48:22.830]  It's pretty convenient.
[48:22.830 --> 48:31.190]  If you have a name account, like I said, you just text message or you send an IM to plus one, and then if you're in the United States, plus one, and then the area code and phone number.
[48:31.310 --> 48:31.810]  Yeah, try it out.
[48:32.130 --> 48:32.650]  Try sending it.
[48:32.650 --> 48:33.330]  Thanks so much, guys.
[48:33.450 --> 48:34.090]  You had a great show.
[48:34.210 --> 48:34.450]  Thank you.
[48:34.670 --> 48:34.890]  Bye-bye.
[48:35.530 --> 48:36.570]  And let's take another phone call.
[48:36.650 --> 48:37.810]  212-209-2900.
[48:37.910 --> 48:38.190]  Good evening.
[48:38.290 --> 48:38.930]  You're on off the hook.
[48:39.470 --> 48:39.890]  Yes, hello?
[48:39.890 --> 48:40.890]  Hi, what's on your mind?
[48:41.550 --> 48:41.910]  Hi, sir.
[48:42.050 --> 48:44.710]  I just wanted to ask two questions.
[48:44.990 --> 48:45.290]  Okay.
[48:45.950 --> 48:54.310]  First of all, I wanted to know, what is the main difference between a Mac and a PC in terms of reliability?
[48:54.770 --> 48:55.890]  And the second thing...
[48:56.330 --> 49:00.870]  That's a personal computer show question, so we're going to leave that question for the guys to come on after us.
[49:01.010 --> 49:02.090]  But what's your next question?
[49:02.810 --> 49:03.350]  Oh, okay.
[49:03.370 --> 49:08.130]  Actually, my second question was still about a Mac operating system, so I guess I'm going to wait.
[49:08.270 --> 49:09.050]  Anyway, thank you very much.
[49:09.050 --> 49:10.430]  That's the personal computer show for you.
[49:10.490 --> 49:13.290]  That's what they do, and we just don't want to get too political.
[49:14.350 --> 49:17.110]  Actually, not Kevin, you've got something you want to share with us.
[49:17.630 --> 49:21.990]  In fact, I saw this same show that you saw, but it's the iBeam show?
[49:22.170 --> 49:24.910]  Yes, put on by the Graffiti Research Labs, which...
[49:24.910 --> 49:25.690]  Oh, yes, our friends.
[49:26.530 --> 49:28.230]  If you're at Hope No.
[49:28.330 --> 49:30.370]  6, you would have probably played with the LED throwies.
[49:30.470 --> 49:41.950]  They were putting on an exhibit down in Chelsea at their iBeam office, and I had an opportunity to go twice now, and it's probably one of the coolest things I have done, art-wise.
[49:42.330 --> 49:51.770]  I got to play with their laser tag system, which basically allows you to write on a wall using lasers.
[49:51.770 --> 49:53.430]  So you're using, like, a laser pen.
[49:53.730 --> 50:03.090]  It's a laser pointer that's hooked up to a camera and a projector and allows me to write like I was spray painting or writing with markers on a building.
[50:03.290 --> 50:13.330]  So you point this thing, and you spell something out, and through the camera and computer, it basically throws an image onto the wall or even building.
[50:13.510 --> 50:14.050]  Even building.
[50:14.050 --> 50:20.590]  It's definitely something that I would suggest anyone who is even remotely interested in any type of art to check out.
[50:20.770 --> 50:31.230]  Plus, they have a lot of films going and all sorts of demonstrations of really cool things, including one of the Aqua Teen Hunger Force figures from Boston that that city freaked out about.
[50:31.330 --> 50:34.950]  They have that up on the wall, and I can't believe anybody would be freaked out by that kind of a thing.
[50:35.150 --> 50:37.210]  Where is it located, and what are the hours?
[50:37.210 --> 50:42.930]  It is located on West 21st Street between 10th and 11th at 540.
[50:43.910 --> 50:44.630]  540 West...
[50:44.630 --> 50:45.430]  West 21st.
[50:45.490 --> 50:46.170]  West 21st Street.
[50:46.310 --> 50:47.910]  And are there hours there as to when?
[50:48.190 --> 50:49.810]  I know it's running until April 7th.
[50:49.870 --> 50:52.710]  It's running until April 7th, and the hours are between 12 to 6.
[50:52.930 --> 50:53.510]  12 to 6.
[50:53.690 --> 50:54.050]  Okay, yeah.
[50:54.170 --> 50:55.090]  Tuesday through Saturday.
[50:55.290 --> 50:56.090]  Oh, Tuesday through Saturday.
[50:56.270 --> 50:56.510]  Okay.
[50:56.610 --> 50:57.730]  Don't go there on a Monday.
[50:57.950 --> 50:58.350]  Or Sunday.
[50:58.390 --> 50:58.730]  Or Sunday.
[50:59.350 --> 51:01.450]  Well, you could, but it'll be very dull.
[51:01.630 --> 51:01.870]  Yeah.
[51:01.870 --> 51:07.790]  And we look forward to the next bit of fun from Graffiti Research Labs, iBeam, all those cool people over there.
[51:08.290 --> 51:09.250]  All right, let's take another phone call.
[51:09.430 --> 51:10.230]  Let's go up here.
[51:10.470 --> 51:10.930]  Good evening.
[51:11.130 --> 51:11.710]  You're on Off the Hook.
[51:13.310 --> 51:13.910]  Speak up.
[51:14.950 --> 51:18.070]  Yes, the question about cell phones on the planes.
[51:18.710 --> 51:21.510]  Didn't they use cell phones on 9-11, supposedly?
[51:22.230 --> 51:28.930]  Well, you know, at that point, I don't think they were going to complain about the noise in the cockpit from the cell phones being made.
[51:28.930 --> 51:33.110]  I think people just sort of decided what the hell at that point, right?
[51:33.210 --> 51:36.850]  Oh, in other words, they were used, but they weren't your conversation.
[51:37.090 --> 51:37.870]  Yeah, I mean...
[51:37.870 --> 51:39.110]  It's basically reference to the noise.
[51:39.270 --> 51:39.910]  Yeah, they work.
[51:40.030 --> 51:42.290]  They will work, but the problem is at what cost.
[51:42.470 --> 51:44.770]  They will cause interference and annoy the pilot.
[51:45.270 --> 51:47.310]  You don't really want to do that, but I guess...
[51:47.310 --> 51:50.350]  But in that case, in that particular instance, it didn't matter.
[51:50.470 --> 51:56.850]  If you see the Pentagon coming up ahead of you or the aliens are taking you onto the spaceship at that point, that's when you want to make the phone call, all right?
[51:57.090 --> 51:58.730]  Depending on which theory you subscribe to.
[51:58.930 --> 51:59.610]  All right.
[51:59.790 --> 52:00.170]  Good evening.
[52:00.390 --> 52:01.430]  You're on Off the Hook.
[52:02.630 --> 52:03.350]  What's on your mind?
[52:03.730 --> 52:05.810]  Yeah, about ATM machines.
[52:05.990 --> 52:06.230]  Uh-huh.
[52:07.090 --> 52:07.790]  I've been...
[52:07.790 --> 52:10.190]  Somebody's been making illegal withdrawals.
[52:10.410 --> 52:11.950]  They managed to get my PIN number.
[52:12.390 --> 52:13.770]  You're saying illegal withdrawals.
[52:13.890 --> 52:14.050]  Huh?
[52:14.250 --> 52:15.150]  Illegal withdrawals.
[52:15.290 --> 52:15.450]  Yeah.
[52:15.590 --> 52:15.750]  Okay.
[52:15.990 --> 52:17.310]  Okay, they're just sucking it out.
[52:17.410 --> 52:18.490]  It's always the same amount.
[52:19.830 --> 52:23.210]  Until recently, it's always been the same thing out in Woodhaven, Queens.
[52:23.210 --> 52:25.150]  I haven't been in Queens in 25 years.
[52:25.150 --> 52:26.010]  I've been up in Manhattan.
[52:26.410 --> 52:26.990]  Oh, you should go.
[52:28.930 --> 52:31.630]  I know, I know, but at my age, I don't get around that much.
[52:31.790 --> 52:32.390]  Well, okay.
[52:32.530 --> 52:33.690]  So, it's coming from an ATM.
[52:33.850 --> 52:34.630]  You're certain about that?
[52:34.790 --> 52:36.230]  Oh, well, whatever it is.
[52:36.850 --> 52:37.150]  Mm-hmm.
[52:37.270 --> 52:46.430]  Because, you know, it's just a series of digits, and it gives like, you know, like 39-10, you know, like they do out there in Queens, and the address on Woodhaven Boulevard.
[52:46.490 --> 52:47.870]  I have no idea what it is.
[52:48.010 --> 52:50.230]  I suspect maybe it's not an ATM.
[52:50.250 --> 52:56.470]  Maybe it's an automated withdrawal that some business somehow is doing to your account.
[52:56.570 --> 53:03.410]  Like, for instance, if I want to pay my phone bill and have it automatically deducted from my account, I sign up with them, and then every month they take it out.
[53:03.430 --> 53:03.730]  Yeah, yeah.
[53:03.770 --> 53:05.430]  I have that with my Verizon bill.
[53:05.430 --> 53:07.910]  So, maybe somebody's doing that without permission.
[53:07.910 --> 53:08.470]  Well, hold on.
[53:08.530 --> 53:09.910]  No, but how would they get my PIN number?
[53:10.430 --> 53:12.030]  Because they don't need your PIN number to do that.
[53:12.250 --> 53:17.190]  Well, you see, the thing was that I took it to, I'm at Commerce Bank, and I took it into one of the bank offices.
[53:17.390 --> 53:19.770]  They sent it out to Cherry Law in Cherry Hill, New Jersey.
[53:20.170 --> 53:26.730]  It took about, you know, three weeks for them to go over, and I only had it, you know, they only did January and February so far.
[53:26.870 --> 53:27.110]  Uh-huh.
[53:27.510 --> 53:32.150]  And I found quite a few of them, and then all of a sudden, something started coming up from Fordham University.
[53:32.550 --> 53:33.010]  Oh, dear.
[53:33.010 --> 53:35.810]  And I have every reason to believe I know who is doing it.
[53:35.910 --> 53:36.410]  Oh, you do?
[53:36.550 --> 53:36.770]  Okay.
[53:37.050 --> 53:41.910]  Yeah, and I can probably get a hold of them, but as far as I know, I don't think I can get a penny back.
[53:41.930 --> 53:46.490]  I looked at the back of, you know, one of my statements in pale gray print, so you can barely read it.
[53:46.550 --> 53:48.350]  It's like you said at the outset of the show.
[53:48.850 --> 53:52.990]  They've got themselves so covered up that they don't owe you, you know, nothing.
[53:53.730 --> 53:57.310]  Generally speaking, you're not responsible at all for any unauthorized charges, so...
[53:57.310 --> 53:58.230]  That's on a credit card.
[53:58.430 --> 53:59.390]  On an ATM card?
[53:59.450 --> 54:00.230]  Oh, this is a debit card, okay.
[54:00.230 --> 54:03.430]  Yeah, well, this is a check card debit.
[54:03.690 --> 54:06.850]  Well, then it's usually $50 per transaction.
[54:06.870 --> 54:09.710]  But even then, you still have plenty of recourse.
[54:09.850 --> 54:16.170]  Depending on who the person is doing this, you can bring criminal charges or civil charges against them.
[54:16.170 --> 54:22.690]  Yeah, yeah, that's the thing, but the thing is, does the bank, now I'm sure you can't answer it, but does the bank have any responsibility?
[54:22.790 --> 54:33.430]  Because I seem to remember when I opened up this account that there was something about, you know, we're so good, we're so calm, we're so loves you, and they're a great bank, but you know, something about...
[54:33.430 --> 54:34.370]  Did you just say their name?
[54:34.890 --> 54:36.110]  Report, report, I'm sorry.
[54:36.230 --> 54:36.750]  Did I just give a report?
[54:36.750 --> 54:37.290]  Well, that's okay.
[54:37.970 --> 54:41.110]  No, no, it's a commercial bank.
[54:41.210 --> 54:41.690]  Right, it is.
[54:41.990 --> 54:55.710]  Well, what they should have done, and what you should do now, is immediately get your account number changed, that will protect you, have that ATM card canceled, and at least that'll put a stop to it, then you can worry about, you know, getting revenge or whatever.
[54:56.110 --> 55:08.630]  That's what I've done, but to this extent, to what degree of, even though with all their done aisles, you've got to report it within 15 days or 20 days or blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, or else they won't do anything, but at a certain point, I remember from several years back,
[55:08.650 --> 55:15.890]  when I really looked over there, you know, the contract with the fine-toothed company, they said, something about reporting unusual activity on your account.
[55:16.370 --> 55:29.350]  Now, if, since I've had that account for about four, at least five years, and there's never been a withdrawal made, I think I made one withdrawal when I was down at BA High, once down at Fulton Street, other than that, all my withdrawals have been exclusively on Amsterdam,
[55:29.590 --> 55:30.710]  Broadway, and Columbus Avenue.
[55:31.430 --> 55:39.090]  And all of a sudden, this turns up, and it's, they're getting, they were getting more and more frequent, and always from the same address in Queens.
[55:39.270 --> 55:47.570]  Now, shouldn't somebody have noticed something odd, or shouldn't they have noticed when somebody makes the same with $120 plus the ATM fee twice?
[55:48.430 --> 55:54.290]  See, it's hard to predict, because how closely is your bank actually watching everything that you do?
[55:54.430 --> 55:55.810]  It's, it's, I don't know.
[55:56.630 --> 56:00.550]  But if somebody is doing it from their, from the same address every time, they're not very smart.
[56:00.830 --> 56:04.990]  Or, you know, it still is possible that it is something automated that's going on, that's a mistake.
[56:05.150 --> 56:07.530]  But either way, your bank should be helping you out with this.
[56:08.610 --> 56:16.470]  After, after everything is transferred, and you have a different account number and a new ATM card, write a letter to the bank president, say that you're not happy with the way you were treated, give specifics.
[56:16.950 --> 56:22.130]  And if, if they don't, if they don't come back with something satisfactory, just move your account someplace else.
[56:22.530 --> 56:26.230]  And that'll teach them a lesson, I think, and tell other people about it.
[56:26.350 --> 56:28.090]  We're going to have to move on to another call, though.
[56:28.190 --> 56:29.710]  I hope that, that was helpful.
[56:30.150 --> 56:31.090]  Contact the police.
[56:31.250 --> 56:32.570]  That should help one way or another.
[56:32.950 --> 56:33.310]  Yeah.
[56:33.650 --> 56:34.090]  Well, maybe.
[56:34.250 --> 56:34.610]  I don't know.
[56:34.770 --> 56:35.190]  Not always.
[56:36.130 --> 56:36.490]  Okay.
[56:36.570 --> 56:39.270]  Shall we try to take one more in the time we have left?
[56:39.370 --> 56:39.710]  Good evening.
[56:39.910 --> 56:40.710]  You're on Off the Hook.
[56:41.130 --> 56:41.350]  Hi.
[56:41.490 --> 56:47.350]  I have, I just wanted to correct something that the guy said about Oboe Pay, that she actually didn't need a bank account.
[56:47.590 --> 56:51.190]  You're going to have to silence the child a little bit, so we can hear you.
[56:51.490 --> 56:51.870]  No, no, no.
[56:51.870 --> 56:52.290]  Somebody's got it.
[56:52.350 --> 56:53.290]  She's just flipping out.
[56:53.450 --> 56:53.670]  Okay.
[56:53.790 --> 56:54.570]  She doesn't like the news.
[56:54.770 --> 56:56.230]  She's probably never been on the radio before.
[56:56.470 --> 56:57.610]  What's, okay, so what's your question?
[56:57.950 --> 56:58.370]  Oh, no.
[56:58.690 --> 57:02.290]  With the Oboe Pay, he said that you don't, that you do need a bank account for that.
[57:02.430 --> 57:03.490]  I actually have Oboe Pay.
[57:03.610 --> 57:06.150]  You don't need a bank account to have the Oboe Pay.
[57:06.250 --> 57:08.890]  They will actually send you a prepaid credit card.
[57:09.390 --> 57:19.990]  Now, the issue there is that, I don't know if you know about this, but there's another potential for fraud if you're using prepaid credit cards and buying on eBay using PayPal.
[57:20.270 --> 57:21.250]  I'm not going to say what it is.
[57:21.330 --> 57:22.550]  People can figure it out on their own.
[57:22.930 --> 57:23.230]  Okay.
[57:23.350 --> 57:24.130]  Well, thanks for the info.
[57:24.510 --> 57:24.810]  All right.
[57:24.870 --> 57:25.050]  Bye-bye.
[57:25.050 --> 57:27.270]  And that's going to be the last call for tonight.
[57:27.470 --> 57:31.830]  Profit, I want to thank you for stepping in tonight and answering so many questions.
[57:32.470 --> 57:33.190]  My pleasure.
[57:33.370 --> 57:34.070]  Thanks for having me.
[57:34.190 --> 57:40.430]  And we look forward to reading Telecom Informer in the next issue of 2600 and all future issues after that as well.
[57:41.110 --> 57:44.730]  We'll be on next week, same time, same place.
[57:45.290 --> 57:46.990]  Until then, stay alert.
[57:46.990 --> 57:49.370]  Write to us, OTH at 2600.com.
[57:49.910 --> 57:52.170]  And we'll do our best to address it on the air.
[57:52.370 --> 57:53.630]  For Off The Hook, Emmanuel Goldstein.
[57:53.730 --> 57:53.950]  Good night.
[58:00.840 --> 58:06.000]  We got up late because we couldn't sleep.
[58:07.440 --> 58:12.440]  We go uptown on the underground.
[58:13.840 --> 58:17.540]  Yet we fall from the sky just to learn how to cry.
[58:17.740 --> 58:20.800]  We dance and we sing just to wash it all clean.
[58:20.800 --> 58:24.120]  And the games that we play are things that we say.
[58:24.320 --> 58:29.120]  And the reason they're uptown.
[58:34.690 --> 58:35.530]  Uptown.
[58:40.080 --> 58:45.340]  We stole a car just to see how far.
[58:46.580 --> 58:51.960]  We spun to fact because life's a drag.
[58:52.960 --> 58:56.740]  Yet we fall from the sky just to learn how to cry.
[58:56.960 --> 59:00.000]  We dance and we dream just to wash it all clean.
[59:00.200 --> 59:00.540]  And the
[59:04.560 --> 59:06.580]  do is cause we do it all day.
[59:26.850 --> 59:27.490]  Uptown.
[59:32.300 --> 59:34.100]  We say I'm clown.
[59:35.340 --> 59:37.120]  Because we're well aware.
[59:38.580 --> 59:40.820]  That it's up and down.
[59:42.100 --> 59:43.880]  It's round and round.
[59:45.100 --> 59:48.820]  Yeah, we can fall from the sky just to learn how to cry.
[59:49.060 --> 59:52.000]  We dance and we dream just to wash it all clean.
[59:52.200 --> 59:55.220]  And the games that we play are the things that we say.
[59:55.440 --> 59:56.740]  And the reason that we did.
[59:59.630 --> 01:00:00.150]  Uptown.
[01:00:01.510 --> 01:00:03.270]  Yeah, Uptown.
[01:00:06.170 --> 01:00:06.690]  Uptown.
[01:00:09.410 --> 01:00:09.930]  Uptown.
[01:00:12.790 --> 01:00:13.310]  Uptown.
[01:00:16.830 --> 01:00:17.190]  Uptown.
[01:00:17.190 --> 01:00:17.550]  Uptown.
[01:00:18.110 --> 01:00:18.470]  Uptown.
[01:00:18.810 --> 01:00:20.010]  Baby Uptown.
[01:00:20.410 --> 01:00:21.790]  Hey, yeah, that was off the hook.
[01:00:21.890 --> 01:00:22.470]  I love that show.
[01:00:22.570 --> 01:00:23.290]  Don't you love that show?
[01:00:23.430 --> 01:00:23.810]  It's great.
[01:00:24.170 --> 01:00:28.510]  I think that's the second best radio show on WBAI.